Gravel Racing with a Heart Condition: My Cycling Comeback, Athletica Training, and a Setback with Ventricular Tachycardia
I headed to the Hungry Bear gravel race in Cable, WI, hopeful. Training had been going well, my legs felt strong, and the early-season races had gone off without a hitch. But just 20 minutes into the race, the familiar signs of ventricular tachycardia returned. My heart rate spiked to 204 bpm, and just like […]
From Heart Surgery to Gravel Racing: My Comeback at the Dirty South Roubaix
Two years ago, I wondered if I’d ever race a bike again. This weekend, I’m back at the starting line for the Dirty South Roubaix in southern Illinois, my first gravel race since heart surgery-and the first of the Heart and Gravel Comeback Tour. I’ll do the 100k race, which I did three years ago […]
From Heart Scare to Comeback: The Journey Behind the Heart and Gravel Tour
The summer of 2023 started off well for training and racing my bike I was holding my own in the challenging group rides with guys half my age on Saturday mornings. When I started to have some irregular heartbeats, sometimes on rides, I thought they were just spasms and ignored them. Even when I was […]
The Heart and Gravel Comeback Tour: Racing, Recovery, and Raising Hope
In 2025, I’m doing 11 gravel races throughout the Midwest to celebrate that my heart is beating normally again and to raise money for pediatric cardiac care. I’m calling it “The Heart and Gravel Comeback Tour 2025.” I’ve had two ablations in the past two years to fix ventricular tachycardia, and the second, done last […]
